The Greatest Story Ever Told is a 1965 film about the life of Jesus, directed by George Stevens (with some scenes by Jean Negulesco and David Lean). Max von Sydow stars as Christ, and the film features a number of other top Hollywood stars at the time, including Charlton Heston as John the Baptist, and Telly Savalas as Pontius Pilate. The movie was based on the 1949 book of the same title by Fulton Oursler.

Production and exhibition

The Greatest Story Ever Told was produced by United Artists. It was one of only nine films shot in Ultra Panavision 70 and was exhibited in larger cities in 70mm Cinerama. The music was composed and conducted by Alfred Newman, and supplemented (at the request of the director) with the Hallelujah chorus from George Frideric Handel's Messiah and the Verdi Requiem, (both adapted and conducted by Newman associate Ken Darby).

The film held its world premiere on February 15, 1965 at the Warner Cinerama Theatre in New York City.

Responses and legacy

The film was nominated for five Academy Awards: Best Musical Score, Best Cinematography (color), Art Direction (color), Costume Design (color), and Special Visual Effects (Joseph McMillan Johnson).

Despite the awards, The Greatest Story Ever Told was director George Stevens' first flop. It cost an estimated $20,000,000 but made back only $12,000,000 worldwide. It was the last of the big budget Biblical spectacular films.

The American protest singer Phil Ochs introduced his 1968 song Cannons of Christianity with a narrative satirically implying that if God himself saw the movie, he wouldn't believe it and declare "It's gone too far. Something must be done about Christianity."

Cast

The large and notable cast also includes John Abbott, Rodolfo Acosta, Michael Ansara, Richard Bakalyan, Carroll Baker, Ina Balin, Pat Boone, Victor Buono, Richard Conte, Philip Coolidge, John Crawford, Frank DeKova, Cyril Delevanti, Van Heflin, Russell Johnson, Martin Landau, Angela Lansbury, Mark Lenard, Janet Margolin, Sal Mineo, Nehemiah Persoff, Donald Pleasence, Sidney Poitier, Joseph Schildkraut, Marian Seldes, Frank Silvera, Joseph Sirola, Abraham Sofaer, Paul Stewart, Harold J. Stone, Michael Tolan, John Wayne, Shelley Winters, and Ed Wynn.^[1]

References

Notes

1. ↑ It should be noted that most of these stars play extremely short cameos. This was a criticism leveled at the film at the time, particularly John Wayne as the Centurion who supervises Christ's execution.

See also

• Dramatic portrayals of Jesus

External links

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